Practice

It is most important to analyze the beliefs specifically. This is always possible only when we understand that Truth brings the belief to light; that the human mind cannot uncover its own error.

When you call the disease animal magnetism, wholly a belief of mortal mentality, you are calling it by its correct name. What educated belief calls it, is not what it is. Cancer, tuberculosis, scarlet fever, war are simply names, and not something which is occurring, then you understand animal magnetism.

Love meets the human need, and one of the needs of the human race is to find out to what extent animal magnetism is claiming to be one’s thinking.

Any effort you may make to rid yourself of sickness and death only perpetuates these errors of belief, since the error is not sickness and death. Sickness and death are evidences of the nothingness of matter, the self-destruction of mortal mind going on as the immutable law of Spirit. They are animal magnetism, a belief of life in matter, and can only disappear by translating matter into its original language, Mind.

“The material body manifests only what mortal mind believes, whether it be a broken bone, disease, or sin.” (S&H 402:18-19)

Remember that what a thing is named, that it is not. Disease is never a condition of matter; it is always a state of mind called matter, a self-destroying error. (S&H 204:306; 227:26-29)

Whatever names you give the error of belief that is uncovered, it is always an error of statement, an error stating Truth in reversion, stating that there is life, substance and intelligence in matter. All substance is Mind. Therefore we look away from the error to the Truth that is forever present. When matter is really understood to be a mortal concept, an error of statement and not a lump of stuff, then error will not be used in stating Truth.

What you are actually witnessing, which educated belief names disease, war, and what not, is the false sense of God and man, named a mortal, finding out that mortality is nothing.

Divine Love meets the human need. The human need is that we shall think divinely, that we shall be conscious of divine facts only, that we shall be aware that the “very circumstance which suffering sense deems wrathful and afflictive” is Love, the divine energy of Spirit, saying, arise from your false consciousness, for that is the only place that suffering is. “Self-abnegation, by which we lay down all for Truth, or Christ, in our warfare against error, is a rule in Christian Science. This rule clearly interprets God as divine Principle, — as Life, represented by the Father; as Truth, represented by the Son; as Love, represented by the Mother. Every mortal at some period, here or hereafter, must grapple with and overcome the mortal belief in a power opposed to God.” (S&H 568)

True self-denial will set aside the belief that we are material, mortal, finite, and thus set aside disease. The denial of material self-hood occurs scientifically when thought looks out from Mind, rather than a person up to Mind.

The human body itself cannot argue for a cancer any more than can a table. It is this false belief of mind that gives us all the trouble. Our textbook says that because it is a myth, it must by its own consent give itself up to everlasting Truth. “That mortal mind claims to govern every organ of the body, we have overwhelming proof. But this so-called mind is a myth, and must by its own consent yield to Truth.” (S&H 151:31-2) (S&H 250:25-27)

If the disease is an error of belief about body, or God and man, it is not “out there,” belonging to a person, but it is “here,” as a belief of a false mind, as a belief that there is a believer in evil. Therefore, the belief must be denied by leaving the mortal basis of belief. (S&H 425:6; 419:28) “Not muscles, nerves, nor bones, but mortal mind makes the whole body ‘sick, and the whole heart faint’; whereas divine Mind heals.” (S&H 219:11)

Sin, the belief of false mentality, constitutes the mortal man, therefore, disease is not caused by sin in the way we usually think of it, but the belief of mortality is the only sin and sinner, and is the only disease. Mortal mind makes its own man, mortal. In order to heal disease and bring to light the indestructible body, the incorporeal body, we must transcend material sense. As Christian Scientists, we do not go through crucifixion and resurrection, the overcoming of evil by good, in order to transcend personal sense and live in the realm of ascension. “The basic error is mortal mind.” (S&H 405:1) “Neither disease itself, sin, nor fear has the power to cause disease or a relapse.” (S&H 419: 10-12) “Deny the existence of matter, and you can destroy the belief in material conditions.” (S&H 368:2931)

“Divine Mind is the only cause or Principle of existence. Cause does not exist in matter, in mortal mind, or in physical forms.” (S&H 262:30-32) “Matter, and its effects — sin, sickness, and death — are states of mortal mind which act, react, and then come to a stop. They are not facts of Mind.” (S&H 283:8-10)

Since the admission of materiality makes disease inevitable, we do not have to consciously believe in disease to have a belief of disease. Anything that identifies us with the belief of false mentality, identifies us mortally, and this is disease. Christian Science has come to show us that matter is a dying error; that all is Mind; that we have the capacity to consciously think as Mind, and thus meet the belief of false mentality which claims to be our conscious and unconscious thinking.

When we recognize that we are not dealing with a substance called matter, but merely with a belief that utterly misrepresents substance, there is no so-called disease that can stand in the effulgence of that understanding.

“You say, ‘Toil fatigues me.’ But what is this me? Is it muscle or mind? Which is tired and so speaks? Without mind, could the muscles be tired? Do the muscles talk, or do you talk for them? Matter is non-intelligent. Mortal mind does the false talking, and that which affirms weariness, made that weariness.” (S&H 217:29-2) Weariness, exhaustion, lack of sleep are not the results of having too much to do; they are the products of a belief in a self-hood apart from God, products of pride and fear, impatience and self-assertion, the arrogant belief in a self-hood apart from God gets tired.

Mind, being consciousness, cannot be unconscious, so whatever sleep is, in the divine Mind it is not unconsciousness. Consciousness is Mind, Spirit, and all we can be conscious of is constituted of Spirit, indestructible, uncontaminated substance. The error is the belief that there is another substance than Spirit. This belief is named matter, but it is false belief, a misstatement of Mind, unreal in all its aspects.

Matter, being wholly belief, a supposition that substance is other than Spirit, a state of mind, is not something that can be destroyed. It is wholly a theory, a formulation. Meet the belief that matter is substance, and so-called mortal mind, in giving itself up to Mind, cannot appear as the destruction of the belief. When matter is seen to be a mortal belief, “Error will be no longer used in stating Truth.” (S&H 126:2)

Remove the sin, the belief of mortality, and you remove its penalty, disease, mortality and death, because the punishment of sin, mortality, is the self-destruction of mortality, and thus you experience the incorporeal body which comes with the ascension.

The breaking up of material beliefs named matter, is not disease, want, woe, war, etc., but is the appearing in consciousness, as consciousness, of true substance, Spirit. (Un. 32:9-17; S&H 193:25-27) When we deal with disease or any discord as the effect of mortal mind, we do not understand that mortal mind is a myth, is a basic error, and an error is never cause to have effect. Error is simply a term to indicate the suggested absence of something. The effect or phenomenon of mortal mind is mortal mind, a false view and not something that is occurring. (S&H 488:23-8)

You waste your strength dealing with effect or matter “out there.” This so-called mind is the basic error and goes right along being the sin until you are ready to see that Mind is One. You cannot meet the belief of matter, named disease, as long as you think of them as effect, (S&H 569:1419; 396:21-22) “as if matter could have sensation.” That is why Mind can destroy all this. (S&H 493:20-21)

Thought that is concerned with the material appearance of things and attempts to correct the appearance, or what is called effect, by correcting the thinking of the so-called human mind, has accepted the human mind as causation and is on as material a level as the one giving medicine to heal sickness. One of the most limiting beliefs confronting Christian Scientists, is believing that effects can be changed by an improvement in the human mind. The human mind never becomes better nor is an effect ever improved. (S&H 230:27-30; 423:15-24; 120:25-29; 251: 1-32)

When assailed by the belief that there are no results from your work, agree with your adversary. There are no results in Mind. The only result in Mind is action or evidence, and that has been from all eternity, perfect, untouched by any belief or interruption; all existence, being reflection, is noumenal, not phenomenal.

When you understand that Mind is One and All, then you must admit that everything in your world comes to you as consciousness. If you do not turn from Mind, cause, to consider effect, you will experience as effect only that which is true, beautiful and satisfying. If “all is Mind,” what is there to turn to and where can you turn? If “all is Mind,” that Mind cannot be conscious of anything but itself as evidence.

The elements of Mind, form, color, etc., are infinite, perfect, ever present. “I believe that of which I am conscious through the understanding, however faintly able to demonstrate Truth and Love.” (Un. 48:19)

On page 442, S&H, we read, “Christian Scientists, be a law to yourselves that mental malpractice cannot harm you either when asleep or when awake.” If the belief of malpractice was not the belief of a false mentality asserting itself as one’s own mind, one could not be a law unto himself. (Oneself)

The mere fact that everything seems to be going smoothly, happily, does not mean that we have met the belief of malpractice. Malpractice is always present as a claim of false thinking, a false mind, the conscious and unconscious thoughts of mortals. “The truths of immortal Mind sustain man, and they annihilate the fables of mortal mind, whose flimsy and gaudy pretensions, like silly moths, singe their own wings and fall into dust. In reality there is no mortal mind, and consequently no transference of mortal thought and will-power.” (S&H 103:25-31)

There are no thought waves even in belief. You cannot send a good thought or a bad thought. So all the good thoughts and bad thoughts are a belief of collective thinking as individual, the one mortal mind.

When you heal a patient, that patient is healed primarily because he is already well. There is no one that exists who does not know God and is not knowing God every instant; since knowledge of God is the only existence. Your understanding of this fact takes care of malpractice. Malpractice is the belief of false mentality and its activity. Anyone unenlightened by Science is the victim of the belief of malpractice, a belief of false mentality. You cannot rest short of seeing that the whole fabric of mortal mind constitutes what is called your mortal mind, either consciously or unconsciously; therefore when one phase of mortal mind seems to disappear, it does not mean that all of mortal mind has been met, so you must be ever alert.

The human being is a law unto himself and is exempt from the belief of malpractice, when he understands that all being is Spirit. If what is called malpractice is wholly a belief of wrong mental practice, and there is only one Mind, and that Mind is God, where and what is the wrong mental practice? Wholly supposititious, wholly unreal. If you believe that someone can think evilly of you or anyone, if you believe that someone can hate you, or is hating anyone, if you believe that ten thousand can fall at your right hand and ten thousand at your left hand, you have accepted the belief of a mind separate from good, and this is malpractice upon yourself. Where is the belief of malpractitioner? Where is the believer in evil? Personal sense is always malpractice, and so a murderer from the beginning. The belief of malpractice and malpractitioner is one. “All sensible phenomena are merely subjective states of mortal mind.” (No 14:6-7)

“The subjective states of evil, called mortal mind or matter, are negatives destitute of time and space; for there is none beside God or Spirit and the idea of Spirit.” (No 16:11-14) We often hear this statement, “The accident was caused by malpractice; my sickness was caused by malpractice.” Malpractice could never be a cause; malpractice is a belief, error. The accident and sickness are themselves a belief of malpractice, a belief of false mind, an incorrect view, the one collective and individual belief which embodies all the evil that we think we see. Mrs. Eddy once said to a member of her household, “In the beginning it was easy to handle sickness, but now we are handling sin.” It is sin to admit that mind is mortal and can know either good or evil matter.

A supposition has no power to be anything. It cannot do anything but fade away in the light of Truth, and is not doing anything but that. A supposition cannot make anyone ill. There is no believer in evil. Any seeming belief in evil is reactionary, which means that a supposition (so-called evil) can destroy nothing but itself.

Mrs. Eddy’s discovery that all is Mind is the “greater works,” and is the prevention of disease, since the only disease there is, is the belief in matter. The time is not far distant when matter will be universally understood as a way of thinking, a mental concept; then the seeming destruction of the so-called human body by disease, accidents or death, will be impossible.

(S&H 90:8-12; also see marginal note “Mind is substance”) Treatment in Christian Science is constant revelation and therefore creation; therefore a real treatment cannot be a formula. Mind is action. Treatment is Mind demanding, supplying its own evidence. (S&H 199:8-12) There are only three things to consider in a treatment: First, cause; Second, substance; Third, law. Covering these three essential points thoroughly, you have covered the essential points in connection with every suggestion.

The time will come, NOW it can be, since it is, when Christian Scientists will think with the clarity of divine Mind without process, and shall acquire the object of their thinking without delay, because the object of their thinking is their thinking. “Mind spake and form appeared.” (Mis. 280:1) All existence is the awareness of Truth. “The life of man is Mind.” (S&H 402:17) This understanding means the elimination in treatment of routine, mere affirmation and denial. “Before they call I will answer.” Before the error is brought to light to be self-seen as nothing, that error does not exist as something but as supposition.

An affirmation of Truth is the acknowledged presence of Truth; it is Mind acknowledging the evidence of Itself. In fact, anything that arises in consciousness, regardless of appearances, is always the demand of Truth upon Itself to be Itself. Human beings seem to arrive at a conclusion through a process of thinking, but we must remember that the conclusion always existed in Mind, and can be arrived at without process, because it already is what it is. You must remember that nothing is to be changed by thinking. Jesus said, “Take no thought.” There is nothing to change. True thinking is the activity of Mind, which does not think about anything, but is Mind forever being infinite. The attitude or viewpoint of the human being changes proportionately as understanding constitutes his consciousness. The patient is what the practitioner knows. Let your understanding determine how you should give a treatment. If you need to argue, understand that you are never arguing with disease but always with yourself, to convince yourself that you cannot believe in evil, that “man has no Mind but God.” Never treat yourself; yourself is all right. Treatment convinces you of that fact. Mrs. Eddy gives a clear statement of what to do if you need a formula for treatment, and here it is: S&H 495:14-24.

Your patient is not somebody “over there” thinking he has a disease, trouble and sin; neither is your patient yourself. There is no patient even in belief; the belief is always mortal mind, and mortal mind is not a patient, nor a practitioner. There is no mortal mind, no private mind, no private body.

The first step is to rejoice in the divine fact that there is nothing to be healed, and that the constant demand is to acknowledge God; that is your opportunity to bear witness to the divine law, in other words, to be what you divinely are.

Encounter everything that arises in consciousness, regardless of its importance, with a joyous anticipation of Mind. Let that Mind be the only Mind, since it is the only Mind, and let your thought proceed from the infinite in all its grandeur. Mind is. Consciousness is. Therefore, all there is to a treatment is the consciousness which is Mind declaring Itself, and simultaneously denying the seeming presence of anything unlike Itself.

You must not make statements of Truth as if you were theorizing. When we make statements in a treatment, we make them because they are true and not because we expect them to accomplish something. (Mis. 201:9-12, 1624)

Our patients will come to us as they came to Jesus and experience healing in the same way, when we live the divine ideas that are the Christ. “The rule and its perfection of operation never vary in Science. If you fail to succeed in any case, it is because you have not demonstrated the life of Christ, Truth, more in your own life, because you have not obeyed the rule and proved the Principle of divine Science.” (S&H 149:11-16; John 6:44)

Let us remember in this matter of argument, that mortal mind always starts from effect, so you may be sure if you are considering effect, the way anything looks, be it good or evil, it is mortal mind and is always evil. “In this final struggle for supremacy, semi-metaphysical systems afford no substantial aid to scientific metaphysics, for their arguments are based on the false testimony of the material senses as well as on the facts of Mind.” (S&H 268:14-18)

If you turn from effect to cause, find Mind, God, as the source and condition of all being, you have the right interpretation of every appearance, whatever named or labelled. “The material atom is an outlined falsity of consciousness, which can gather additional evidence of consciousness and life only as it adds lie to lie. This process it names material attraction, and endows with the double capacity of creator and creation.” (Un.35:26; 32:17-19)

The denial of evil is really the state of consciousness that knows no evil. When you understand the nature of the lie, you cannot beat that for a denial. A lie is always a lie about something true, present. When you understand that what educated belief calls disease is the breaking up of material belief, which means the better visibility of Spirit, can you beat that for a denial of disease?

“Everything that God created, He pronounced good. He never made sickness. Hence that is only an evil belief of mortal mind, which must be met, in every instance, with a denial by Truth.” (Mis. 247:29-32)

The human mind cannot uncover and deny error, since the belief that Mind is human is the error. The human mind cannot lift itself by its own bootstraps. It is Truth which says, “There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor substance in matter”; it is not mortal mind that says it. It is not mortal mind that says, “There is no disease.”

Mortal mind says, “How can I fulfill the conditions of being nothing without disease?”

Our book says, we should begin our treatment by “allaying the fear of the patient.” How? What is fear? Fear is ignorance; ignorance is this unknown; fear ignores the fact that God is All. The human race is always fearful of the unknown. Fear is met by self-denial; the denial of material self-hood. Fear is the manifestation of the error of material sense or extinction; naturally, the belief that being is personal and material, being a belief, a lie, would embody the fear of self-destruction, since a lie, being nothing, always includes within itself the seed of its own dissolution. Therefore, to remove fear, we do not argue against fear. Our argument is always with the suggestion that there is a mind to be afraid. This basic error that Mind is mortal, is all that is wrong.

The mind of man is God, wholly good, wholly lovely, and there is no other mind, no mind to be afraid. (’01 14:14-16; Rud. 9:10-16)

We must understand that this belief of being a mortal always embodies fear, since it denies Life. Even when the mortal does not seem to be afraid, as a mortal he is always afraid. Mortal mind is a state of extreme fear.

There is no malpractitioner other than that which claims to be your own mind, the self-admission that there is a mind apart from God. (S&H 462:20; 84:14)

We cannot outline how disbelief in evil will look to human sense. We do know Truth brings a disbelief in evil. No one actually believes in evil, so disbelief in it has to be apparent. Error stating Truth has to be seen as Truth stating Truth. Error makes the nothingness of nothing apparent. (S&H 225:26-28)

On page 267:27-28, S&H, Mrs. Eddy speaks of error as “Waymarks to eternal Truth” (marginal heading). Therefore, you do not ignore the error nor turn your back upon it, nor do you say of it, there is no Truth in it, it is nothing, and let it rest at that; but you recognize that all belief implies the existence of spiritual reality and is actually a proof of the presence of Truth. As Christian Scientists, we let go of the belief and acknowledge the ever-present Truth, which Mind is forever unfolding as individual conscious being.

In this way, the denial of error, the denial that the concept is human, becomes an automatic process of reversal.

Ascension does not mean going some place. Science and ascension are synonymous, the giving up of sense testimony, false beliefs. In this realm of Science which is the ascension, there is no crucifixion, no resurrection, no dying, no awakening, no putting off the old man and putting on of the new. Ascension is the horizonless Truth, not error stating Truth, but Truth in all its glory, declaring the perfection of all being; the fourth dimension of Spirit, subjective Being in all grandeur. (S&H 195:19-22)

We often hear the word “destroy.” This is not a good word, since nothing is ever destroyed. What is apparent as mortal mind being self-destroyed, is Mind being All.

Omnipresence means permanence, permanent identity. The presence of Truth dissipates that which is not, so there seems to be a change. Nothing, however, changes.

God is All, yesterday, today and forever. (Mis. 102:32)

The fourth dimension of Spirit, which is the true measure of Being, is the eternal duration of Truth. Duration means enduring, abiding, continuing, and therefore it means indestructibility. We enter this realm of horizonless Truth through Christian Science, and can completely disregard appearances.

Absent from the body, effect, matter, and present with the Lord, with understanding, with comprehension, which is the fourth dimension of Spirit, we are no longer confined in the three-dimensional world of matter.

The Christ-consciousness is not concerned with setting aside so-called human laws, it is concerned only with its joyous, harmonious Being; this awareness, which is Truth, sets aside the three-dimensional belief, so that what appears as a sick man to material sense, is well and alive outside the prison of material belief. (Rud. 6:3-11; 1:114)

In our work as practitioners, we cannot outline what the appearance of this unfolding idea will be to finite sense. (S&H 120:15-19; 550:10-14; 423:15-18; 250:15-25)

Note marginal heading “Mortal existence a dream.”

Anything and everything that seems to be occurring in the human experience, is due to the Christ, and is for the triumph of Truth. Understanding being the line of demarcation between the real and the unreal, and being true self-hood, enables us as human beings to differentiate between Truth and error, and gives us the power to rejoice regardless of what seems to be going on.

When you begin to understand the Science of Being; when you begin to understand the absolute God, when you love Truth, not in order to correct the errors of the human mind, then you are a practitioner of Christian Science.

Mr. Kimball said, “Suppose this room were infinity; suppose it were possible that suggestion could knock at the door and say, ‘I am here.’ Infinity could not hear this or take cognizance of it, and no matter what the aspect it assumes, there is nothing there but perfection, and to perfection suggestion does not exist.”